With oodles and oodles of political correctness and an utter lack of historical understanding, President Obama credited Islam with having made major contributions to human knowledge in physics, math, navigation, medicine, astronomy, and chemistry. In so doing he gave credit to the followers of Mohammad which properly belonged to Europeans, Chinese, the Greeks of the Classical Period and the astrologers of the ancient societies of Mesopotamia.
The compass goes back to China. The use of zero as a place holder was developed by businessmen in India. The foundations of modern physics may be dated accurately to Galileo. Copernicus laid the base of modern astronomy. Predating both and providing the basis for the work of Galileo was the pioneering efforts of Archimedes of "Eureka!" fame. For Copernicus, the data compiled by Ptolemy were central.
Many, if not most, of the presumed advances in medicine laid improperly at the feet of Muslims were actually the product of Jewish physicians exemplified by Maimonides who practiced their calling under the Banner of the Prophet because they and their coreligionists had been expelled by the Catholic Christians of Spain. This, at least, proves that Islam is not alone in ignorant intolerance.
It is true that Arabic translations of many ancient Greek works preserved the knowledge from the censors and reactionaries of the One True Church so that they were available for re-translation into Latin as the Dark Ages of Europe faded. This reality introduced some problems such as the persistence of Arabic terms (eg algebra, alchemy) and Arabic names for celestial objects (eg Aldebaran and Betelgeuse.)
There is no doubt but the desert dwelling Muslims observed the sky. But, we know from the archaeological record that all that was seen by the late coming Muslims had been systematically compiled by the astrologers of the Land Between The Rivers two thousand and more years earlier.
Muslims dabbled in chemistry or, to err on the side of accuracy, alchemy, as did the Europeans. But, their contributions to what emerged in the Seventeenth Century as chemistry was of no more consequence than the searches for the philosopher's stone by the alchemists of Europe.
The Muslims cannot take any credit for serving as a transmission belt between Asia and Europe or between the Classic Age of Rome and Greece and the beginnings of the Renaissance. Both were accidents. An accident of geography and trade routes. An accident of time, particularly the time of Catholic intellectual repression.
In short, the Muslims were no more critical in the development of modern science and technology than the Geek's Apache ancestors. As far as physics, math, chemistry, astronomy and medicine are concerned, the Muslims might just as well have never existed.
And, it could have been no other way. Islam ascribes all causation to the will of Allah. The positing of supernatural causation assures that science as we have come to understand both the term and the method behind it cannot exist, cannot even begin.
Science in Europe had to battle against the "Will of God" stricture. Ultimately, science won. But the battle was not short, was not low cost and continues in an important way yet today. One need not look behind the absurd claims of the "creationists" to see that reality.
In truth the battle never really got underway in the societies dominated by Islam. This is not to say or imply that Muslims are not personally, individually, capable of mastering the methods of the several scientific disciplines. Rather, it is to conclude from the historical and contemporary record that the doctrine and dogma of Islam fights against the development of true, wide-ranging, joyously inquiring, icon shattering science.
Unless and until the Muslim collective mind can come to some sort of consensus on the limits of the "If-Allah-Wills" stricture, there will not be any more science in the Islamic societies of tomorrow than there was in the past.
That's a tough truth. Tossing aside the culturally implanted dogma of religion and the personal identity features which come with it is not easy. But, unless and until it is done by Muslims generally and not simply a few here and there, who run the risk of being slaughtered as "apostates," people of Islamic adherence will never be full partners in the scientific quest to better understand the universe in which we live.
President Obama and his speech writers deserve an "A" in political correctness. They merit a flat out "F" for history. And, an "F" for doing real service to the best aspirations and potentials of Muslims everywhere.
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